About

 Why are my books filled with dolphins that don't exist?

While browsing through public domain images shared by the Biodiversity Heritage Library on Flickr, I came across this dolphin -

 

 

"Elliot's Dolphin". Which, as far as I knew, does not exist.

When I started looking for more nonexistent dolphins in old books, I ended up finding several, and then a dozen. Turns out, hundreds of the unique individual cetacean species named in books throughout history no longer exist. In cetologist Tom Jefferson's 2021 paper Nomenclature of the dolphins, porpoises, and small whales: a review and guide to the early taxonomic literature, he sources and clarifies all the scientific names applied to delphinoid species post-Linnaeus. Of the total 358 delphinoid species named, only 50 are currently considered valid. And that's just delphinoids, never mind Baleen and Sperm Whales.

 

A footnote in A Book Of Whales (1900) alluding to Delphinus coronatus, a species described in 1812

 I have not found a singular solid answer regarding why, but I think multiples factors (especially the fact that cetaceans themselves are hard to observe from a distance) have contributed to the sheer amount of seemingly made-up species.

Many of these misbegotten species are what taxonomists call synonyms - that is, different people observed the same species and separately gave it a different name. Most of these cases have been cleared up in recent decades (the first recorded name for a species takes priority), but for a surprising amount of cetaceans, it isn't clear what living species is being described in these journal entries.

Throughout the 19th century, information about the biology of the world's oceans were limited. The few books and illustrations made about cetaceans were copied verbatim with the copiers having no way of verifying what the original seafarers saw, so inaccurate information and nonexistent dolphins would often persist through books for several decades.

What is a paper whale?

In a similar vein to paper towns and paper sons, these are whale species that only exist on paper. And while cetaceans are far from the only animal group to acquire many nomen dubium, their ecology makes them uniquely susceptible to it. My loose definition of a paper whale can include the following:

•          A species whose physical description differs significantly from any known cetacean species.

•         An anomalous individual which is treated as a unique species by its describer, i.e. a Right Whale with a tall dorsal fin.

•         A cetacean treated as a unique species on account of it being sighted far from its usual range, i.e. a Dusky Dolphin in Scandinavia.

•         A cetacean species treated as a cryptid or a cryptid that is described as compellingly cetacean-like.

      Intrigued by this phenomena, I decided to start a series of drawings where I'd read the original descriptions of these bygone cetaceans and draw them based on these descriptions. Many of these species have not been drawn since the 19th century and earlier, and some have not been drawn at all despite their peculiar features. My main focus is species that do not closely resemble any currently known species, so I'll likely skip obvious synonyms.

This blog will mainly serve as my own personal catalogue of these species as I draw them. It also gives me space to cite my sources and explain the creative decisions I considered while making the drawings. I'm far from an expert in cetacean art, so I apologize for any wonky or vague anatomy - I'm hoping this series will also encourage me to improve my skills.

 How this blog works

So, as stated above, I made this blog to document the various now-disproven cetacean species I stumble across in books. Most will probably have an illustration by me, but if I'm lazy or don't think the species warrants a new illustration, I might just make a blog post about the species anyway.

Above is a guide to the information I put on each drawing. If I cannot fill one of these sections, I'll leave it blank.

As far as names go, I'm not a taxonomist and so I don't think it's my place to be changing historic names. For the sake of citation, I usually use the oldest name assigned to the species.

If a species was only ever referred as as "unidentified whale" in its origin text, I will probably take the liberty of giving it an informal name. I'll base these names on some sort of defining characteristic - its location, discoverer, physical traits, etc. The additional describer/date/publication cited elsewhere in the drawing will point towards its specific origin.